Peanut Butter Tears
by Zvezdana
Summary: response to the "Peanut Butter Sandwich" challenge over at WIKTT; Hermione loses her husband and turns to drinking cranberry juice and eating peanut butter for an escape, but no one likes to see a pretty girl cry
1. Silver Bullets

A/N: Alright guys, this is my response to the "Peanut Butter Sandwich" challenge over at WIKTT, hope you enjoy it!

Chapter 1:

_Silver Bullets Put an End to What May Have Been Love_

"What do you mean you mean exactly what you said you mean?" Hermione asked, staring at the head bobbing in the green flames of the fireplace.

She was standing in the beautiful Victorian house, the Black house, which Harry had left to the Order of the Phoenix. Of course, now that Voldemort was dead, and Harry too, for that matter, there was no need for the Order to keep the house. Dumbledore, in his ever omniscient way, had given the house to Hermione and Remus.

Hermione granted herself a watery smile. Remus had proposed to her about three seconds before plunging into the final battle, and she had said yes two seconds before she herself had gone.

The battle had been a spectacular thing, full of multi-hued spells bouncing through the air accompanied by cries of rage and pain echoing and reechoing in the vast cavern of the hollowed Alpine mountain in which they fought. Suddenly there had been one explosive flash of green light, a boom louder than a dropped atomic bomb, and darkness for every creature in a 100 mile radius.

In exactly seven days, most awoke again. Everyone was a bit disoriented, and a few ministry and Order officials who had not been present during the battle appeared to arrest the still-dazed Deatheaters. Hermione had gone searching for Remus, desperate to know if he was still alive, but what she found broke her heart three thousand times over.

Harry Potter, her best friend since she'd entered witchhood, was dead. He and Voldemort were laid across from each other, stretched to full length and with looks of such peace on both their faces you'd think both were genuinely destined for heaven. Near Harry, so near Hermione could tell he had been present in the final moments of battle, was Remus.

His hair seemed grayer than ever before, his face more wrinkled than Nicholas Flamel's, Remus Lupin seemed dead tired.

She had waited by Remus's bedside for weeks, praying and muttering and pacing, desperately hoping he would awake. It was during that time that Dumbledore had appeared next to Hermione.

"Sirius would have wanted the house left to him, you know," he gestured toward Remus's still and torn body, "but Harry, would have left it with you." Hermione nodded, uncertain as to what Dumbledore meant.

"Since the house was left in my care, I have decided to leave it to both of you," Hermione's head jerked up in time to see Dumbledore's eyes twinkling and her ex-headmaster departing. And she continued to wait.

Now what she heard could not be true. It couldn't be. After he had survived teaching at Hogwarts and being with the Order and fighting the final battle, how could it come to this?

Her husband of three glorious years was dead. Shot in a hunting accident. By a farmer. On the full moon. _WHAT KIND OF FARMER TRAIPSES AROUND WITH SILVER BULLETS?_ She raged within herself. Yet it was true, so very true.

She did not attend the funeral, she did not put an obituary in the paper, she did not respond to the condolences cards she was sent. No, she went to Wales and got herself drunk the only way she knew how.


	2. Getting Drunk Without the Aid of Alcohol

Chapter 2:

Getting Drunk Without the Aid of Alcohol

Staring deep into her very tall glass, Hermione heaved another sigh, and another.

"Hey baby, what's wrong?" asked the kindly, flirtatious bartender, doing what bartenders do best.

Racking another sob, Hermione said, tears nearly streaming down her face, "Well..." and she lost all her will to tell anyone, "I need a sandwich."

"A sandwich?"

"Yes," she sniffed, "to dry up all the alcohol."

"Alcohol? All you've had is cranberry juice!" she burst into tears and he ran to make her a sandwich.

The bartender returned with an enormous turkey, lettus, mayo, and cheese sandwich, smiling pleasantly at the almost-hysterical woman sitting on the bar stool before him. She scowled, left a one-pence tip, and took her sandwich to sit outside on the lovely rainy day it was in Wales, a day which perfectly fit her mood.

* * *

"Hermione?" The rich, friendly, ever curious voice greeted her. It was a voice she hadn't heard since she left Hogwarts.

"Ron!" She leapt off the dingy step leading to the dingy bar. "What are you doing here?" She hastily whipped away the tears remaining on her cheeks.

"I live here now, 'Mione," she scowled at the nickname.

"Ron! I haven't seen you for ages! You weren't at any of the Order meetings and you weren't at the Final Battle and Ron, oh Ron...Harry's dead, Ron, he..."

"I know." His tone was more grave than she had ever heard it, resigned to a fate he hadn't seen.

"Why weren't you there, Ron?" her voice was soft and came out barely above a whisper. He looked at her with a sadness in his eyes that seemed almost as great as her own. She swiftly shoved aside her woes and turned her full attention on him. He sat down heavily beside her feet, she in turn sank down beside him. She waited for him to speak, watching the rain, hardly daring to make a sound lest his wild eyes grow more frightened and he skitter off.

"I did a horrible thing, Hermione." More rain. More silence between them. "I k...I k...I can't." He inhaled a deep, shuddering breath, than stood to go.

"Wait!" she grabbed his hand and pulled him down again, "What did you do, Ron? We all did bad things during the War, it can't be any worse than the rest of us!"

He looked directly in her eyes. His blue eyes, which had one been a bright as a summer's sky were dull. As glossy and lost looking as dust-incrusted sapphires. "I killed Ginny." Hermione took a swig of cranberry juice. "And Fred." She could not bring herself to speak. She tried many times to ask "Why?" but her voice would not leave her throat and all that escaped was a faint hissing noise. "I don't know why. I wasn't possessed. I just..." He shook his head, stood, and walked back into the rain. Hermione's mouth was open as she watched him go. She went back inside and ordered a large cranberry juice, on rocks.

A/N:

I know this was a horribly short chapter, the next one will be longer, I promise, and it will show up sooner. I want you all to wish a Happy Birthday to stellagirlsx6 over at WIKTT, the birthday is on November 7, she's the one who created the challenge

Special thanks to "Random Reviewer" for being the ONLY one to review my first chapter, I hop I haven't lost you in the wait!

Zvez


	3. Peanut Butter Tears

Chapter 3:

Peanut Butter Tears

Someone had taken her seat in the bar. Hermione could notdecide if she would rather pull up the sleeve of her robe and whop him one, or slink into a corner. The man sitting on her stool seemed almost as drunk as she was, and he was, slightly oddly, she thought, working his way through a shot glass filled with water. Or vodka, but water seemed more likely.

Shaking her head, Hermione decided the man was far too big to beat up and the corner far too dirty to slink in, so she turned around and headed aimlessly into the rain. Not far from the dingy pub was a bright and friendly diner. It was the sort that half-broke teenage boys took their dates, single mothers dragged their kids, and business men met their prostitutes. Hermione ordered herself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, no crusts. And a large cranberry juice, of course.

"Excuse me, have you seen this man?" asked a very smallperon with a fairly high voice. He was waving a wizarding photo of a large-nosed brooding man over her plate.

"Not recently, no," she answered, her voice dead. The small man immediately became alert.

"What do you mean by 'not recently'?" he probed.

"I haven't seen him for…" she counted.

"What exactly is your relationship with this man? How did you meet? Do you keep in touch? Are you aware…." Hermione snapped.

"HOW DO YOU BLOODY EXPECT ME TO ANSWER YOUR BLOODY QUESTIONS IF YOU DON'T GIVE ME THE BLOODY CHANCE?"

The small man was taken aback.

Hermione took a steadying breath, "Now, I apparently made a mistake," something was wrong here, and she wasn't going to go risking her past now that the future was ruined, "I have never seen that person in my entire life." Her voice had a very purposeful calm, "The person I was thinking of is blonde. At first I thought that," she gestured to the thick black hair, "was a hood." The little man gave her a suspicious stare and toddled off to bother other patrons. Hermione took a big gulp from her glass.

Some time later, she heard another voice asking the waitress if she had seen the man in a brandished photo. The waitress shook her head, and the man holding the photo turned to speak to someone else when Hermione caught sight of orangey-red captured in the ink. She turned in her booth to get a better look at the holder when something made her choke on her juice.

"Sna…, Se…," she spluttered, "Sir!" The man turned around, she jerked her head towards her table and spun around, hoping none of the other customers had noticed her odd behavior.

The man slid across the faux leather seat till he was directly across from her. "Miss Granger," he said, "I didn't think I'd see you here." Hermione felt all the anger, all the hurt of the past days well up inside her.

"It's not Miss. Granger anymore," she said through clenched teeth, "It's Mrs. Lupin." Severus Snape shifted his weight a little.

"Well…" he began.

"Can I get you something, sir?" asked a cheery woman with an up-do and notepad.

"Oh, uh…a peanut butter sandwich."

The waitress looked at him like a grown man should never ask for a peanut butter sandwich, "And jelly?" she asked hopefully, "peanut butter and jelly?"

"No." Snape scowled at her, "I said peanut butter and that's what I want," his voice was meancing and his words unnecessarily clipped. When the abashed waitress had turned away, Hermione berated him.

"You didn't have to do that!"

"Do what?" he snapped back.

"Be mean to her like that!"

"She wasn't listening!"

"She was doing her job!"

"The customer is always right!"

"Not always! What kind of grown man eats a peanut butter sandwich?"

"Are you waiting for a client, _Miss Granger_?"

Hermione sucked in her breath and asked shakily, "What did you say to me?"

"You know, I was going to congratulate you, but now I wonder why such a kind thoughteven crosed my mind."

"Congratulate me on what?" she hissed vehemently.

The waitress slipped a generously made sandwich and large portion of chips in front of Snape.

He watched under hooded eyes as she swayed her hips away. "On your marriage, of course. Yet now I've decided I actually feel sorry for that flea-bitten dog."

Hermione burst into tears.

A/N: Whoa! I haven't updated…forever. Originally I had planned to have this chapter out by November 10, but I got wrapped up in Draceo and Hermionette (if you've the time, go read that, too!) Anyway, updates should be more frequent now, and if anyone cares, I would love to get hate mail if I don't update within two weeks of each chapter


	4. Oops

Chapter 4:

Oops.

The waitress with the up-do, who was delivering a Cola to the next table, glared at Snape, who was awkwardly patting the suddenly sobbing Hermione on the shoulder.

"HEEEE'S DEAAD!" She raged at him. She eyes watery, her nose red, and spit bubbling out of her mouth as it does when someone cries very hard. She threw back her head and took long gulps of cranberry juice. A young woman at the next table with heavy eyeshadow and a short skirt edged away.

Taking a fortifying sip from her glass, Hermione whipped her eyes furiously with a napkin and took a determined bite from her sandwich. The peanut butter was very creamy, and seemed to relax her. With a look of extacy, Hermione leaned back, chewed thoughtfully, and put her feet on the opposite seat, dangerously near Snape's thigh.

"So," her voice was pitched low and husky by the already vanished tears. "I hear somebody's looking for you. Why would that be?"

Snape rolled his eyes. "Short guy, with a photograph that's eons old?" Hermione nodded. "Ugh. That's my mum." Hermione nodded understandingly into her glass, then stopped.

"Your _mum_? You did hear me say 'guy', right?"

Snape allowed a hiss of air to escape his large nostrils. "Yes, Miss Gr-, Lu-, Hermione. My mother got a magical sex change about a decade ago. Thought she would set a fashion."

Hermione looked up, interested, "Did it work?" He glowered at her.

"Have _you_ gotten a sex change yet?" Hermione sniffed daintily.

"Well, if you're going to be like that, I'm leaving." She stood up quickly and clapped a hand to her forehead. "Whoo! It seems I've had a bit too much to drink." She took a shaky step forward and promptly collapsed, sliding first onto the table and then into her ex-professor's lab.

Hermione smiled dreamily up at him, took a deep, shuddering breath, and began to snore. The waitress glared at Snape again. The girl with the eyeshadow decided now would be a good time to go to the bathroom, and Snape got up to leave.

The waitress glared at him pointedly, nodding to Hermione, who was now limply draped on the floor, and glared at Snape again. Snape looked down his large nose, sniffed hugely, and bent to pick up his student. He draped her over his shoulder, staggering a bit from the weight, and growled at the smugly smiling waitress on his way out the door.

A man at the next table but a 20 pound note on their vacated table. "That was a good show," he announced to the diner. A table of little children cheered.


End file.
